no offense, AP, you the man , a darn good trader and i agree with you 98% of the time........however, be sure to
call me next time you have 500 million under management.
The Education Of A Speculator
- Thread starter Johnny
- Start date
no offense, AP, you the man , a darn good trader and i agree with you 98% of the time........however, be sure to
call me next time you have 500 million under management.
The guy is so dearth of creativity he had to STEAL the title of a book for his thread. Why not "education of a trader" or something else. You guys are too much!
surf
Quote from marketsurfer:
The guy is so dearth of creativity he had to STEAL the title of a book for his thread. Why not "education of a trader" or something else. You guys are too much!
surf
I doubt that the author of this thread intended to steal the title of VN's book. Most likely he never heard of it...nor VN. Believe it or not Surf, not everyone out there who trades has heard of the great blow up artiste'.
it's possible.
however, back when Education was written it was almost REQUIRED reading for the street, a national best seller, so i find that he never heard the title dificult to believe. Using this title is wrong, pure and simple, regardless of your opinion of VN.
surf
<i>"call me next time you have 500 million under management."</i>
The ink's barely dry on my CTA, surf. Gimme a couple of years, we'll see what happens. Can promise you this much: I know enough to be short call options, not put options when VIX is at 13-year historical lows.
When you see Vic next time, have him give me a call. I'll be happy to point that out to him. Low VIX = sell calls. High VIX = sell puts. The people who used to have that $500m before it evaporated would've appreciated VN knowing this little fact.
The ink's barely dry on my CTA, surf. Gimme a couple of years, we'll see what happens. Can promise you this much: I know enough to be short call options, not put options when VIX is at 13-year historical lows.
When you see Vic next time, have him give me a call. I'll be happy to point that out to him. Low VIX = sell calls. High VIX = sell puts. The people who used to have that $500m before it evaporated would've appreciated VN knowing this little fact.
Required.......come on man. Thats stretching it. If you believe in his thing and can deal with oversized ego, then sure its a very good book. I have read parts of it...just not for me.
As far as using his title on here? Come on man...this is a public chat board. There are a lot of things written on here which aren't original.
Have a drink and calm down Francis.
Hi Johnny,
I didn't know you had started a journal. That's a good idea, but if I were you, I would make it a private journal (p.e. a blog) - you see what happens when you make it public. If you need/want some specific advice, you can always post in ET asking for it (and cross your fingers).
3-4 hours a day for scalping is more than enough. Actually, at the beginning you'd be probably better off by spending LESS time in front of the screen MORE concentrated and focused, you will see it's easy to get distracted. Also, you should take into account how much time you need to prepare before the actual trading (reading news, seeing where the different markets are, reviewing your plan, etc.) and how much time you need to review your trading (plot your P&L, grade your trades on whether you followed your rules or not, see what you could have realistically done better - without the benefit of hindsight, that is - replaying the key parts of the session, etc.). IMHO, you'll learn more, faster and better if at the beginning you spend more time preparing and reviewing than trading, particularly if you replay the session, not so that you can make huge fake $$$$, but so that you can - maybe - see what you missed in real time.
Of course, the more time you can invest in front of the screen, the better - provided that a) you stay focused and b) it does not have a long-term negative impact in your life.
In this record-high volatility environment with huge overnight gaps, swing trading futures is probably not the best way to get initiated into trading, I'd stick to day trades (minutes-hours) if that's what you mean by scalping (to me scalping is 0-2 seconds, not for a trader at home, but you'll see that there are many different opinions on this).
Moving out of your parents will cost you hard cash, but it will save you so much mental cash that it's probably worth it. Just make sure you have a nice "treasure chest" as you call it. By the way, if you allow me the personal digression, when I went backpacking round the world the best piece of advice I ever got was: "Pack your bag and make a budget. Done? Good, now empty half of your bag and take twice as much money". Similarly, I would recommend you decide how much capital you need to start and what your risk per trade is going to be. Done? Good, now cut your size in half and save twice as much.
I don't know Nisson and I have nothing against him, if you learned anything useful from his book/s, great. Just keep in mind, he is a salesman, not a trader. On candle patterns, make sure you read pages 8-9 of Bulkowski's Encyclopedia of Candlesticks Charts very carefully:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0470182016/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-link
When you start watching the market, I'd recommend you use a top-down approach: start studying historic long term charts, then middle term charts, then short, etc. As you do so, try to analyze them using whatever you have learned, technical or fundamental analysis, news-driven moves, etc. Try to pinpoint what happened when and why. I.e. if you see a spike recurring in an hourly chart, find and determine its cause: news report? open/close? failed S/R?, etc. Once you get the gist of it, start recording the session and playing it back, but at a higher speed, so that you can watch in about 45-60 minutes a whole session, and again try to determine what is happening, what is driving prices. Then move to real-time charts. This way you will have accumulated more experience, faster and in a more structured way.
Lastly, although I disagree with NeoRio1 (I think you should continue reading until you have a solid theoretical framework), he makes a really good point: "the more you read, the more beliefs you have about the market that aren't yours". You should carefully consider that as you move from theory to practice.
Best trading,
Jorge
I didn't know you had started a journal. That's a good idea, but if I were you, I would make it a private journal (p.e. a blog) - you see what happens when you make it public. If you need/want some specific advice, you can always post in ET asking for it (and cross your fingers).
3-4 hours a day for scalping is more than enough. Actually, at the beginning you'd be probably better off by spending LESS time in front of the screen MORE concentrated and focused, you will see it's easy to get distracted. Also, you should take into account how much time you need to prepare before the actual trading (reading news, seeing where the different markets are, reviewing your plan, etc.) and how much time you need to review your trading (plot your P&L, grade your trades on whether you followed your rules or not, see what you could have realistically done better - without the benefit of hindsight, that is - replaying the key parts of the session, etc.). IMHO, you'll learn more, faster and better if at the beginning you spend more time preparing and reviewing than trading, particularly if you replay the session, not so that you can make huge fake $$$$, but so that you can - maybe - see what you missed in real time.
Of course, the more time you can invest in front of the screen, the better - provided that a) you stay focused and b) it does not have a long-term negative impact in your life.
In this record-high volatility environment with huge overnight gaps, swing trading futures is probably not the best way to get initiated into trading, I'd stick to day trades (minutes-hours) if that's what you mean by scalping (to me scalping is 0-2 seconds, not for a trader at home, but you'll see that there are many different opinions on this).
Moving out of your parents will cost you hard cash, but it will save you so much mental cash that it's probably worth it. Just make sure you have a nice "treasure chest" as you call it. By the way, if you allow me the personal digression, when I went backpacking round the world the best piece of advice I ever got was: "Pack your bag and make a budget. Done? Good, now empty half of your bag and take twice as much money". Similarly, I would recommend you decide how much capital you need to start and what your risk per trade is going to be. Done? Good, now cut your size in half and save twice as much.
I don't know Nisson and I have nothing against him, if you learned anything useful from his book/s, great. Just keep in mind, he is a salesman, not a trader. On candle patterns, make sure you read pages 8-9 of Bulkowski's Encyclopedia of Candlesticks Charts very carefully:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0470182016/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-link
When you start watching the market, I'd recommend you use a top-down approach: start studying historic long term charts, then middle term charts, then short, etc. As you do so, try to analyze them using whatever you have learned, technical or fundamental analysis, news-driven moves, etc. Try to pinpoint what happened when and why. I.e. if you see a spike recurring in an hourly chart, find and determine its cause: news report? open/close? failed S/R?, etc. Once you get the gist of it, start recording the session and playing it back, but at a higher speed, so that you can watch in about 45-60 minutes a whole session, and again try to determine what is happening, what is driving prices. Then move to real-time charts. This way you will have accumulated more experience, faster and in a more structured way.
Lastly, although I disagree with NeoRio1 (I think you should continue reading until you have a solid theoretical framework), he makes a really good point: "the more you read, the more beliefs you have about the market that aren't yours". You should carefully consider that as you move from theory to practice.
Best trading,
Jorge
It wouldn't be the first time!
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/member.php?s=&action=getinfo&userid=34266
We both know exactly what VN's personal & unedited writing style looks like. Just read a couple of his posts, and you'll know this is no impersonator!